#21/#22 Wayne State 21 #18/#20 Nebraska-Kearney 16
Wayne State College held Nebraska-Kearney inside the Wildcat 10-yard line in the final 10 seconds to win a thrilling 21-16 non-conference football game over the Lopers Saturday evening in Wayne before a crowd of 3,182 fans at Cunningham Field. Wayne State was ranked #21 by USA Today Sports Weekly, #22 by Lindy's Football Magazine and #25 by D2Football.com while UNK was ranked 18th by Lindy's and #20 by the Sporting News College Magazine.
Wayne State started the game with a big play as sophomore running back Mario Melvin raced 82 yards before stepping out of bounds at the UNK three-yard line as he dove for the end zone. However, three plays later, senior quarterback Silas Fluellen was picked off by UNK's Eric Scheele to stop the early scoring threat. Later in the first quarter, UNK struck first as Rustin Dring scored from one yard out to cap a seven play, 68 yard drive to put the Lopers in front 7-0. The lead was short lived as on the ensuing kickoff Wayne State's Frederick Bruno rambled 90 yards for the score to even the contest at 7-7 with 3:33 left in the first quarter.
UNK responded on the next drive as Jordan Alegria booted a 48-yard field goal to give the Lopers a 10-7 lead at the end of the first quarter. Both teams had scoring chances in the second quarter, but Wayne State's Nick Hope was wide right on a 36-yard field goal with 10:51 to play in the half and UNK's Alegria was wide right on a 37-yard attempt with two seconds to play in the first half as UNK held a 10-7 lead at the intermission.
Wayne State gained some offensive momentum in the third quarter and took their first lead of the game with 3:36 to play in the third quarter when Silas Fluellen found Frederick Bruno on a 50-yard scoring play to put the Wildcats ahead 14-10. On the first drive of the fourth quarter, WSC marched 80 yards on 12 plays with Mario Melvin running four yards for the score to increase the Wildcat lead to 21-10 with 12:09 left to play.
However, UNK would not quit as the Lopers drove 90 yards on nine plays midway through the fourth quarter to cut the lead to 21-16 after Jake Spitzlberger connected with Shane Carraher on a eight-yard scoring play. The two point pass failed to keep the score 21-16. After UNK forced WSC to punt, the Lopers drove from their own 36 yard line with 2:07 to play and marched to the WSC four yard line. The big play of the drive was a 37-yard pass from Spitzlberger to Brendan Leiss. UNK, without any timeouts, had the ball first and goal at the WSC nine and got as close as the four yard line. However, a false start penalty pushed the ball back to the nine yard line and two incomplete passes to Tyrone Hilton on third down and an incomplete pass on fourth down to Kyle Kaiser in the left corner of the end zone stopped the UNK drive and Wayne State held on for the exciting win.
UNK finished the game with 467 yards while Wayne State gained 421. The Wildcats had 198 yards rushing and another 223 passing. Sophomore running back Mario Melvin ended with 135 yards on nine carries and one touchdown to lead the Wildcat ground attack. Through the air, Fluellen completed 16 of 31 passes for 233 yards with one touchdown and one interception. His top receiver was senior Logan Masters, who had seven receptions for 83 yards and has now caught at least two passes in all 36 games he has played in a Wildcat uniform. Frederick Bruno added three catches for 67 yards and one score and finished the game with 209 all-purpose yards.
Defensively, senior linebacker Ryan Reeves recorded a game-high 15 tackles, including 11 solo stops, while Ryan Molacek accounted for 10 tackles.
Wayne State will be on the road next weekend as the Wildcats open Northern Sun Conference play at MSU Moorhead with kickoff set for 1:00 p.m.
